vinnie3004

Absolutely, its a very isolated city and that suits many people but its only when you do travel out of Perth you realise just how isolated you are. The choice in the UK is unreal and something i guess most people here take for granted but when you move somewhere that does not have that sort of choice then you really notice how good it is when you return. Right down to the choice in electricity and gas providers, tv and internet services, supermarkets, restaraunts - all of which want your business. 20 minutes one way and we are into urban London, 20 minutes the other way and we are in country side where you feel like you are a million miles away from the hustle and bustle. Yet still you have lots you can do.

Great post - a lot of similarities to where we are right now! Except my husband will be the one finding the job in the UK (although I will be hoping to find something part time and will then look to put my son in daycare for 3 days a week once settled. Quick question about the fact that your mother in law helped you secure a property before you moved over - would you recommend this? I'm now thinking of flying home with my son a few weeks ahead of my husband just to try and get the property sorted before he arrives, will be a lot less stressful I can imagine and would mean that we would only have to stay a short amount of time with my mum before moving into our rental property... I think because we know the area well we knew what parts of the town we wanted to be so focused our search around these. Most agents got back to us and were very happy to deal with the mother in law. She knew what we liked and we took her word for it really. Luckily we were not let down when we arrived but we also knew that this wasn't out forever home, it was a years rental while we found our feet and decided where we could afford to and would like to buy after this. i guess if you have the option to come back and sort it yourself then it would be better. We made sure when we arrived we went and visited the agent and they were lovely and i think it reassured them that we were good people although my mother in law is a lovely lady so they were quite assured anyway that we were not dodgy. Good luck with the move back. It seems daunting but its actually quite easy really and most stuff does fall into place if you plan it well.

Hello All, For those that sent me lots of questions about the move and for those who just fancy a read heres an update on my move home. Background I have lived in Perth for 12 years. I moved over with my mum, dad and 2 brothers when i was 18. Met my now wife in Sydney who was travelling and believe it or not lived in the town about 20 minutes up the road from where i lived in the UK. I went back to stay with her for a few months and then she came out to visit before eventually applying for a visa and joining me in Australia. This was in 2012. We have since had a son (17 months old now). About a year ago we visited England to show the baby off to my extended family and my wife family. We started to become really homesick (I had always found it the hardest out of my family and new one day i would head back) and really missed the UK and our friends, more my wife friends as they had all had babies at the same time as we had our son but i was still very close to a lot of my friends as well. We made the decision officially in July of this year and put the house on the market and started to plan. Told my parents who were of course devastated as i had just given them their first grandson. Originally the move was not going to be until June next year. Then out of the blue my wife received an email from her old boss asking how everything was. They started talking and it was brought up that her old job had just become available and that she should apply as we were heading back but we would need to make the move permanent in Jan 17. Total coincidence. My wife applied for the job and got it. Brilliant. 1 of us had guaranteed employment which was a huge weight off our shoulder. We already had a holiday booked back to the UK in the October just gone for a friends wedding and after a bit of chat decided it would make sense to just go then which my wife boss loved as it meant she would start sooner. Told the folks and obviously they were even more devastated. I won't go into how the final 2 - 3 months were with them, but it was hell. Sold the House in September, finance all finalised just in time for the move and shipped our furniture 2 weeks prior to leaving. Everything just fell into place in such a short period of time. A lot of planning was put into it but we had a some good fortune as well as some bad fortune (Perth property market is very bad right now). Securing a house in the UK We had already looked at houses to rent on the web and luckily my mother in law went to view a handful on our behalf before we managed to secure a property in the town my wife is from by offering 6 months upfront. The town my wife is from is in greater London and as expected the prices for houses to buy and rent are pretty high. But we knew this so no complaints here and decided that for convenience and my wifes commute to work in London it was a good idea to set up home there for the first year while we settled in, got our feet on the ground and had the support and help from family and friends very close by. We will then look to head a little further out once we are settled which would fit into our budget. Shipping As mentioned we shipped our furniture 2 weeks prior to us leaving as this meant it would arrive within 2-3 weeks of us getting there. We were comfortable doing this as the final two weeks in perth we stayed at my folks and we had a house secured here. For those 2-3 weeks in england we stayed at my mother in laws, don't get me started on that. Furniture arrived, delivered to the house, unpacked and finally we had our home back and was able to set up our new life and get on with it. The shipping company we used were Chess - 1 word amazing! They were great, cheap, thorough and just brilliant both ends. The first 6 weeks My wife settled back into her job well, we have seen all of our friends and family and are feeling very good. We have our son in day care for 2 days a week at the moment to settle him in before i start looking for work just after christmas which he will then go 4 days a week. He loves it in day care and we are so pleased we found a great one close by, a huge weight off our shoulders. So right now I'm the house husband/ baby sitter and its bloody hard work! I now know why my wife had had enough of maternity leave after a year! Its actually been handy having me at home as i have been able to set the house up and do all the essential bits that you need to do when you set up life somewhere new which you may not necessarily be able to do as easily if both were working. After being here for 3 weeks i returned to perth for 7 days as we had return flights already booked as it was just meant to be a holiday. This allowed me to sort the dog out, get him shipped over and finish off a last few things in perth, mainly have a leaving do with my mates and a week off with the folks after 3 tiring weeks! Doing this trip was good for me as it allowed me to see my parents and ultimately reinforce that i had made the right decision. Would i have done this if the return flight was not already booked prior to us knowing we were moving home? probably not and i was dreading it a bit and thinking it was a bad decision but I'm glad i did it. So 3 weeks on from returning from Perth and I'm back, still loving it and continuing to set up shop. Good decision based on early findings? For us, absolutely. Australia is a fantastic country, it was my home for 12 years. I was lucky enough to travel all of Australia through work and personal holidays and it is a beautiful place. However, right now, at this point in time, my wife and i wanted to be in England, needed our strong social network here that enabled us to socialise with our son included as all our friends here have kids and just to be home, where we both feel like we belong. In Aus our friends were in different stages and we didn't have a massive social network so very rarely did anything. My wife had a very close circle of friends here in the uk and never really settled 100%. We pretty much socialised with my mum and dad which was not healthy for our marriage. We could have made more of an effort but we got into a rut and just wanted to come home. Will this move be forever? We don't know, right now we belong here and want to be here, but in 5-10 years time we may want to head back, who knows. Probably not but were lucky enough to all have dual citizenships and have that option. England - If i haven't bored you already and you are still reading I just love it, its only when you move away from something for a long period of time do you realise that England really is a great country. Yes its got its faults but what first world country hasn't? The history here is just amazing and i appreciate it a whole lot more now after spending 12 years in perth. The novelty may ware off slightly but i don't think it will to be honest, the countryside here, the life style, the villages, as previously mentioned the history, its just great and there isn't a day where i do not stop and look at a building and think wow. The ease of access to everywhere (south east), the choice in everything, its overwhelmingly brilliant. yes theres some not so nice places and a few undesirable people but i was under no illusion that i would not see this occasionally. And yes the prices in the south east are expensive, but we worked hard, saved hard and can afford it right now. However, i do not think general day to day living it is anymore expensive than Perth. Houses may cost a lot more here but look what you have on your doorstep. At the end of the day, if you have the option to move somewhere that will make you happy or you think will make you happy then take the chance and do it. Right now this has been the best choice i have ever made and i will do everything in my power to make this successful, however i have the right attitude so i doubt this move will ever fail. I will miss my family in Perth, i will miss certain things in Australia, i will get "Australia Sick" occasionally but that is to be expected. I should also add I'm not one to look at things through rose tinted glasses, i new what both places were like, the pros and cons of each, i just pined to be home where i feel like i belong. Cheers!

Yeah i get what you are saying regarding the property taking a while to sell. Ours was relatively quick but we took a hit on it (big time) as the perth market is diabolical compared to when we purchased the house 3 years ago. Ashame really but the ongoing costs and my wifes employment opportunity with her old job was to good to turn down so we just accepted the offer. I believe if we have waited we could have lost more anyway, i think the saying goes 'your first offer is always your best offer' especially in a market like this. Yes we are both originally from England. i have been here 12 years now and my close family (parents, brothers) all live here in perth but my wife has no one and all of our close friends and connections are at home and it just turned out that all of our friends at home had children the same time our son was born (2015) so that was also another massive pull back as our friends here are in very different stages of life. We did use rightmove yes, we found an abundance of properties on there and ended finding what we were after, albeit on a slightly busier road than expected but you cant have everything. We are leaving Perth October 12th so hopefully all does go well but i guess its what you make of it. England is a cracking place to live so i don't see any additional dramas that you wouldn't face if coming the other way. Good luck :-)

We managed to sort a rental out from here so we purposely looked for properties that we new we could fit our furniture into and within our budget. Once we found one, we asked family at home to go and look and check it out. Once we got the thumbs up we got it sorted. We thought about selling furniture but we would seriously get next to nothing for it and then have to fork out again for it. Plus our furniture is what makes up our home and its nice knowing we will have some home comforts following us. Thats my view anyway, lots do sell and start completely again, but we worked hard to buy decent furniture and my wife and i really like it so didn't want to part with it. the little things i guess :-) When are you thinking of moving? we started the freight process about 2 months prior to our date and that seems to have been ample time for us.

Hahaha i just re read it and thought exactly the same. I will have to try and edit it! Re the insurance i just assumed that the insurance offered from the freight company was similar to finance offered at a car yard (high rates, high set up fees etc) and i went and got a quote from an independent insurer and found them soon much cheaper than the freight company. The guy from chess pretty much said to continue doing what i was doing as if to say its cheaper and better. The price was for us to pack our items, so they dropped loads of boxes of different sizes a month (allowed us to pack at our own pace and not have to do it frantically at the end) before the collection and we just packed anything that could fit in a box. They also provided paper to wrap items. All the big stuff (couches, furniture, beds, pictures, mirrors) was left for them to wrap. They then packed it all into the container and it was done. Easy as that.

Hi All, Just a quick note to anyone that may be looking for some recent experiences with shipping companies. Yesterday we had our 20ft container packed up and taken away for shipment from Perth back to the UK which we are returning to on October 12th permanently. We had many companies come out to us and quote but i couldn't recommend highly enough the services of Chess. Obviously only half of the shipment process has completed with the arrival and unpacking back in the UK still to commence but i will provide an update when that happens and do not envisage any changes to my positive feelings of the this whole process so far. Chess were by far the cheapest and although sometimes cheaper is not necessarily better i was very confident that these guys would deliver on my expected service. I think even if they had been more expensive i would have gone with them because of how comfortable i felt about the whole process and the vibe i got from the very first day i contacted them, being the cheapest was just an added bonus to the whole process! From the moment Paul came out to quote on our freight to the freight being collected it was smooth, hassle free, easy and enjoyable. The quote was based on a measurement estimate of 28 cubic metres. I do not think he could of been anymore spot on with that measurement if he had tried. Everything we wanted to take was included and packed into the container so precisely. Paul was fantastic, down to earth and did not try to sell anything, it just naturally happened because of how comfortable we felt dealing with him. None of this cheesy pushy sales pitch. Once i said i would sort my own insurance out that was it. no more on the matter and no pushing to get me to take up the insurance through the freight company which would have been about 3 times the price based on quotes from other company's. I didn't even need to ask Paul for a quote because i took the fact he asked once and after i said i have done it myself he didn't mention it again and said good job! BTW for freight insurance, Letton Percival were bang on for price and service. And to top it off the shipment will take just 4 weeks from Perth to London. I was under the impression 8 weeks was the minimum so that was an added bonus as we have a rental property already secured when we get there in mid October! The guys who collected our freight were brilliant, funny, professional and easy to be around. Everything just felt right and when you are upping and moving to the other side of the world those moments of feeling comfortable and not worried are welcomed with open arms. As i mentioned above i do not expect the second half of the process to be any different even though its Chesses UK partner Britannia who delivery our furniture. Give them a go, i think you will be pleasantly surprised at the cost and service compared to a number of other company's. Just incase anyone is interested we paid $7200 for full shipment and delivery of our 20ft container. Cheers,

Thanks :-) I will have a read this morning. Our house is now on the market so until that sells its a waiting game! We are now moving back in January. My wifes job will hold out until then and it will give us an extra few months to sort things out. Cheers

Really good to read this and take on board someone else experiences. We too are moving back to the UK from Perth shortly and do not know where to start. Hadn't even thought about insurances and no claims etc etc. Out of curiosity, why did you leave Perth? Cheers

We cant have the dog in the flat because residents in this complex cannot have pets plus our boy is a big lad and is 35 kilos of solid muscle. I don't actually think he will fit in the flat! We do have other options for him though if needed. Other friends in the UK would be more than happy to take him in until we got sorted. he fact he is a larger dog worries me with rentals in the uk. im sure we will find someone that would let us have him though! We really just want to get going now and its exciting just thinking about it! Not the best time at the moment to sell properties in Perth but not everything will go our way. Ideally the pound will drop slightly so transferring money will go in our favour but with the eu referendum going on its hard to know what will happen with the exchange rate.

Your right with there being no point in prolonging the agony and feeling in limbo is exactly what we are feeling right now. We just want to settle and get on with things. We are going to have a good look through everything this weekend and see what can go and what has to come with us! its exciting!

Thanks for your response. Out of curiosity do you recommend the October route because there is a job offer there or because there is no point prolonging the move? Luckily we can stay with my mother in law but she lives in a 3 bed flat so although there is room for us all the dog wouldn't be able to stay there. We were hoping we could leave him here with family freinds for 3 weeks then fly him over once we had found a rental. Interesting point though regarding the 5 day gap. We may have to work out an alternative for that. How much did it roughly cost to fly your dog back? im worried about finding a rental with a dog. I see alot of rentals on right move and zoopla state no pets! Its good to know you didnt find any issues though. Thanks again,

Hi All, Since my last post a few things have happened, some good and some bad. The family here in Perth wont accept my choice to return and the guilt and pressure im feeling is quickly building up to the stage where im just eager to get going quicker and quicker. It doesn't help that they became grandparents 12 months ago and i will be taking him away but at the end of the day i have my own family now and need to do what we want to do. They just cant understand our choice and whether they are intentionally trying to make me feel guilty, which i do not believe they are, i certainly am feeling an overwhelming amount of guilt for choosing to leave with my wife and son! On the other hand my wife's parents back in the UK have been very supportive. Even when my wife decided to come out here 4-5 years ago. so at least 1 side is easy to deal with! Originally we were looking at returning June - September next year, however my wife has been offered her old job back that she left 4 years ago to come here. Better money, same boss who she loved working for and a good opportunity. For them to keep this job for her it would be mean returning in October. We were originally returning for a holiday in Oct for a friends wedding so the flights are already booked. The only thing is they are returns so would probably lose some money on them if we were to go one way. Not really an issue though. The job opportunity is quite perfect as it means instead of both returning without work and the unknown of when work would arise, one of us would be earning which is very ideal. We have saved enough money to cover rent for 6 months so it would really help us get our feet back on the ground. I have one question. October is 4 months away. How quickly has someone returned and what were the steps you took, the order in which you would recommend doing stuff and how you went about doing it as i really do not know where to start. Our situation: We own our house so would need to sell. My wife and i both have UK passports. Our 1 year would need one of them so we need to sort that first. We have a dog (we have already cleared him with the UK as to whether he would be allowed in as he is a collie x staffy and we know there are some rules that prevent certain dogs returning based on likeness to banned breeds etc.. We also have a family friend here having our dog for our holiday in Oct so im sure they would have him until we flew him over once we had a house. We have a fair bit of furniture. Some we will sell but the majority we would take. We have two cars which we would obviously need to sell. We both work full time. Son is in day care. Parents would help out here even though they cannot accept us moving! Telling them im potentially leaving in October and not June and that they now have 4 months with us and my 1 year old son and not 12 is another hurdle that only i can deal with. That will be an event in itself and something im dreading doing so i don't expect any advice on how to handle that one. Any help or guidance based on experience would be greatly appreciated :-) Thanks

Wow that is pretty similar. My wife is 35 and i am 29. My son is doing great, 10 months old now and he has developed the most adorable personality. Its great fun having him around but it makes it harder trying to work out what is best to do as he is our priority now and i want him to have a decent upbringing. I know he will get that here but i also know he will get that in England, just different. Yeh its definitely wise to get your citizenship. It will make it easier if your plans ever change down the track. Perth is a good place to bring up kids but Perth is also a reasonably new city and for me i find still find it very underdeveloped and isolated. I just returned from the gold coast (business trip) and the difference to the eastern states is very clear to see. I also realised again just how isolated we are over here. 5.5 hours on the plane returning from Brisbane with a whole lots of nothing in the middle! crazy! I do love it over east, i find it a very different Australia to Perth. Its almost like they are 2 completely different countries. If we were to stay in Australia we would definitely relocate over east. Keep me updated with how you go and what you end up doing. It must be hard if your partner is reluctant to go. I have never been reluctant to go, i just worry about my family here and the sadness it will cause them now we have our son. But i do have to live my life and im sure they and i will move on. Its not like i will never see them again!

Your absolutely right and i have tried to be realistic about everything to my wife and have said repeatedly that once everything we say we miss right now becomes a part of our life, then were not going to be pining for it anymore and will no doubt pine for stuff in Australia. That is just natural though i think, like you said. Ive tried to lay everything down on the table, the negatives as well as the positives because i would hate for her and myself who are looking through things with rose tinted glass right now to regret it. I don't think we will, but i can't stop thinking about 'once all that stuff we miss becomes the norm and part of life' scenario. At the end of the day you make the most of what you have and there is no bouncing back and forth between countries as its costly and disruptive so it needs to be a solid decision that we will stick with. For the foreseeable future anyway. This has definitely not been a light hearted decision and lots of thinking has gone into it but there is also an element of just getting on with it and trying it because you can put as much as you like down on a bit of paper to weigh things up but until you do it you never really know. All i can say is we will make it work and after living in Australia for a long time i will definitely see things with a different perspective compared to before and will enjoy the little things a lot more.